


The Five Senses

by Kagutsuchi



Category: Naruto
Genre: Action, Angst, F/M, Romance
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-02-23
Updated: 2013-02-27
Packaged: 2017-12-03 08:56:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 3
Words: 4,716
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/696535
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kagutsuchi/pseuds/Kagutsuchi
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In the smoking ruins of a village in the Land of Grass, a young girl wanders, mad with grief. But there is yet living a boy who knows her, and needs her.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. The Second Death

**Author's Note:**

> This fanfiction explores what might have happened between Sasuke and Karin before the formation of Team Hebi, then picks up in the present day. Readers should take note of the following information from the Third Naruto Databook about Karin: "Once in a village* wiped out by war, there was a young girl, all alone and totally unscathed. 'She could tell lots of people were coming.' Which prompted Orochimaru into inviting Karin to the Hidden Sound village... She's served Oto (the Sound) ever since, thanks to her honed perception ability, and her clear head. But even as Orochimaru's underling, Karin feels no obligation towards him. Karin still fulfills her duties out of affection for Uchiha Sasuke." (*"Village" here means "A normal village, not a shinobi housing facility.")

The crowns of the trees blocked out any daylight unfiltered by the deep viridian green of the surrounding Forest of Death. Karin panted, clutching at a stitch in her side, her arms slick with a sweat that made the chill forest even colder.

She wasn't surprised they'd left her alone. The three of them had never been close, what with her being so quiet and timid. She had few skills in ninjutsu and taijutsu, though her skills as a Sensor were unparalleled in her village. They probably figured she'd be useless in a fight to retrieve a Scroll of Heaven if she couldn't adequately defend herself, so they left her behind. They didn't hate her. Things would just be more efficient this way.

But they had entrusted her with the Scroll of Earth, so she had to hold onto it. If she wasn't strong enough to take the Scroll of Heaven from another team by force, she could at least do that.

She was leaning against the bole of an enormous tree at the foot of which she had stopped to catch her breath when she was set upon by an enormous bear.

"Guys! Where are you?" she called out to her team. She recalled that when you're confronted by a bear, you should seek high ground and make yourself look as big as possible. She laughed hysterically. There was no way she'd ever be able to do that. The bear was enormous, almost as tall as the towering tree beneath which the two of them now faced each other.

Karin turned to run, but after having leaned over for a while, and given the sweat-slickened state of most of her body, her glasses slid from her face and onto the ground. She couldn't see a thing without them; she had to get them back. Or she would most certainly die. Dropping to her knees, she clambered forward as quickly as she could, reaching for a dark blur she hoped was her glasses. The bear bellowed and, if her ears could be trusted, readied itself to lunge at her.

"Shishi Rendan!" cried what sounded like the voice of a young man, probably her age.

The bear let out an agonized roar, the cry of a creature on its last legs. Karin looked towards its hulking mass, now motionless and supine. A boy stood on its head. Having found her glasses, she put them on and craned her neck upwards from where she lay on the grass.

"Oh, you have the Scroll of Earth too," he said. He was ebon-haired and pale-skinned, with an angular, aquiline face. They looked at each other for a moment. Karin didn't know what to say – she hadn't expected help from another village, and she'd been told that she ought to be suspicious if it were given. But he had saved her – if he'd wanted her scroll, he could've taken it after the bear had killed her.

He smiled at her, without a trace of irony or condescension. "Bye, then." And with that, he was gone.

 

Karin knelt in the corner of her home, now little more than smoldering rafters and a few blackened beams to support them, weeping into hands blackened with soot.

"Why are you crying, child?" lisped a strange, uncanny voice, at once hoarse and melodic. She turned towards the speaker, a tall, pallid man with serpentine eyes and long black hair. What new devilry was this? A boy stood behind him – she could easily see them both, for her house no longer had any walls.

"D-don't come any closer."

"I don't intend to harm you. I make it my habit, in fact, to care for talented young shinobi, and cultivate their powers. Isn't that right, Sasuke-kun?" The boy had come closer, so she could see him better.

"You're th-the boy from the Chunin Exams…in the Forest of Death." He nodded, his face without affect. He'd had a smile on his face the last time she had seen him, after he had saved her life, but he was easy enough to recognize. She noticed he was not wearing a hitai-ate.

"Just leave me here, p-please," she managed to stutter between heaving sobs.

"What happened here?" asked the man.

"Everyone is dead. Go! Please, I beg you!"

"You're not dead," the man said gently. "Do you consider yourself a ghost?"

Karin looked at him dead-on, and there was a burning hatred in her eyes, though he could tell it wasn't for him.

"It has been said that you die two deaths: one when your physical body is destroyed, and another when you are forgotten. When everyone who ever knew you or cared about you has been annihilated, you have bypassed the first death. I have already died twice."

"But I know you," said Sasuke. That was all he said, and his expression remained impassive, but he said it so emphatically and with such self-possession that it calmed her grief, at least momentarily. Out of nervous habit, her hand went to her glasses, adjusting them slightly.

"You are not dead, then," the man said, leering at her and making her extremely uneasy.

"No…perhaps not." She hugged her knees closer to her chest and scooted further back into her corner.

"How long have you been here alone, child?" Karin imagined he was taking in her feral state – her bedraggled, greasy hair, her sleep-encrusted eyes, her wasted face.

"Three weeks now."

"What is your name?" asked the boy, Sasuke.

"Karin."

"What happened to you, Karin?"

"There were several units of Hidden Stone shinobi…they came to my village and easily wiped it out. We have few shinobi here, though we do manufacture supplies for Kusagakure, and the Iwagakure shinobi took out everyone in the village as a warning to Kusagakure." She had said all this with difficulty, voice quavering all the while, but Sasuke had locked eyes with her, and his steady, attentive gaze sustained her. He used no suffixes; he addressed her directly. His frankness was not rude, it was intimate in a way she did not expect, and was exactly what she needed.

"How were you able to escape?"

"I could tell that people were coming. I went into the forest and hid my presence with a chakra-concealing technique I've been developing." She bit her lip so hard, it turned white. "I have no skills in combat. I…I just did what my parents told me I ought. They wanted me to live."

"I see. You're a Sensor…" said the man, stepping closer to her now. "How would you like to attain the power to punish those who destroyed your village? Who killed your parents?"

Karin said nothing, but continued to look to Sasuke, whose gaze hadn't wavered. She hadn't really thought about revenge. She'd always been so weak; how could she ever have the power to do as such?

"If you do, then come with me. I will teach you the illimitable possibilities of the shinobi. No one will ever take from you what is precious to you ever again."

She met the man's reptilian stare, golden eyes flickering in the half-light of dawn. "If I am not already dead, then I almost am, if only two people know me. I don't intend for anyone else to know me."

With sudden vehemence, Sasuke swept his arm in a crescent before him, taking in the whole of the village. "Doesn't their blood cry out to you?" There was an accusatory glint in his eyes; they were all sharp edges and there was no room for pity in their gaze. 

Orochimaru looked at her sidelong. He terrified her, with his deathly pallor and his fixed stare. He had not once blinked since he had looked at her. 

"What do you intend to do with me?"

"It is just as he said," said Sasuke. "You will be trained."

"To what purpose?"

Sasuke was silent, and his thoughts were clearly elsewhere as he looked up and into the clouds of mist that hung low above them. "It depends on what I need at the time," Orochimaru said in measured tones. 

She looked around at her village, little more than ash and charred wood now. A bleak sun was rising over Hidden Grass. Its pale face shone weakly through the oppressive fog that clung clammily to the approaching dawn, feebly illuminating the silver meadow that encompassed the village. The mist had begun to dissipate with the rising sun, but Karin knew it would not shine brightly here today. Though the fog would disperse, the smoke would shroud this place a while longer. Karin had loved this land of verdant hills and lush forests. But there was nothing here for her now.

"I will go." A smile spread across Orochimaru's face to reveal the glint of uncannily sharp canines. Choosing to focus instead upon the retreating back of he who had saved her from the first and second deaths, Karin got to her feet and followed these two strange interlopers out of the ruin she thought would be her grave and into an uncertain dawn.


	2. The Wildcard

She was slow, this girl. Not slow of mind, as far as he could tell, but she could not keep up with him and Orochimaru very well. He watched her intently and she tried to avoid making eye contact with him, though he did notice that, not infrequently, she would look at him, only for her eyes to dart away just as swiftly.

"I'm sorry," she said. "But I will need to rest soon…I am not as strong as the two of you."

"That's fine, Karin," said Orochimaru. "In time, you will come to increase your endurance. For now, do not worry yourself about it."

They came to a halt in a secluded grove, hidden above by the overhanging branches of trees so immense and high reaching that the forest canopy blocked out what little daylight was left. Orochimaru left to do whatever it was he did every night. Sasuke had never seen him sleeping.

He removed a sleeping pallet from his backpack. There was only one.

"Karin, here." She looked up from the small fire she was making.

"Oh, Sasuke-kun, you don't have to—"

"Don't call me that."

"But I've only just met you."

"Look—" He sat down across from her on the loamy forest floor, the fire crackling softly between them. "There is no need to address me formally."

"Why?"

"None of that matters." He was practically glaring at her at this point, and she shifted uncomfortably. "Now, there's only one pallet to sleep on. You can have it, if you want."

"Oh, that's alright. I mean, I couldn't take yours."

"Fine then."

"O-okay…" He set the pallet down within the light of the fire, laid down, and turned away from her. She lay on the forest floor, which was rather grimy and moist. She regretted not accepting the pallet, but she knew there was no way she'd be falling asleep soon anyway.

Karin rocked back and forth where she sat, tugging at her red hair, as she was wont to do when anxious. What was she doing, alive? She didn't care for vengeance. It was what was to be expected, given that everyone she knew was dead, and she knew who did it. But it was pointless – blood was not like water. Once shed, it did not recall life from the soil. She continued to worry her hair.

She still had her kunai pouch, and the weapons in it shone brightly in the dim light, still shiny and unsullied by soot. Karin took one from her pouch and without really thinking about what she was doing, started hacking away at her shoulder-length red hair. Everything irritated her right now, including this horrid red hair that hung in her face, reminding her of everyone in her red-haired family, peculiar in the dark-haired Kusa no Kuni. Whatever she was doing, she was doing a poor job of it, her hands shaking with grief and fury. She stopped, laid herself slowly down on her bed and huddled beneath the sackcloth blanket. Only then did she realize she still had the kunai in a vicegrip, white-knuckled. Karin let it fall to the stone floor and clatter along the ground. She drew the covers closer about her, shut her eyes tight, and counted as high as she could, waiting for a sleep that would not come in these early morning hours.

 

She awoke in a deep green half-light, the morning sun just barely reaching the forest floor after traveling through the dense upper reaches of the forest. Sasuke was already up and standing on a thick, low-hanging branch, leaning against the bole of the tree with his eyes closed. Orochimaru was still nowhere to be seen.

"Good morning," Karin said.

Sasuke said nothing.

"You could at least acknowledge my existence. What's with you?" Sasuke opened his eyes, surprised by the edge in her voice. She was almost as surprised as he was. She had always been known for having a rather mercurial temperament – generally shy and mild-mannered, but a spitfire when angered. And no one – herself included – knew what her breaking point was. She found it hard to control her emotions when flustered or aggravated. But since the massacre three weeks ago, she had not felt angry at all – just desolate at best and numb at worst. It felt good to feel something other than grief and despair, and for once, she welcomed the vitriol that flowed through her veins.

"Nothing," he said dismissively. He looked away, but then turned back to her once again. "Good morning." She smiled involuntarily, and was thrilled at the fact that she did so. It had been too long since she had last smiled. He surveyed her side of the fireplace, noticing the copious amounts of red hair scattered about the clearing. 

"What've you been-"

" _Nothing,_ " she retorted. If he was to keep a close hand, then so was she. "What's Orochimaru-sama doing?"

"Don't call him that."

"Why?"

"He knows he's stronger than you. He doesn't need a title. And you don't need to remind yourself that he's stronger."

"O-okay…" He was glaring at her again, but she was beginning to realize that these withering looks were perhaps not all they seemed. He was, perhaps, giving her advice. He did not seem to like to talk. Maybe this glowering was his way of impressing upon her the importance of his words. But she'd rather he were straight with her; this was no time for equivocation.

"You know you can just tell me that what you're saying is important. You don't have to look at me like that." He turned away from her again, looking off into the forest. "Seriously, look at me!" He did, with that same cold glare. "Cut it out! I don't need to put up with that, along with everything else!"

He leapt off the tree and landed right in front of her, just a few inches from her face. "Look," he snapped, "if you're coming with Orochimaru, you can't let something as insignificant as a stare-down get under your skin. You're walking right into a trap if you do."

"What do you mean? It was only because of you that I came!"

"I know. But you can't be this way."

"What way?"

"Vulnerable. Weak. Quick to anger. You will be destroyed that way."

She backed away, crunching the remains of yesterday's fire into the soles of her sandals.

"Alright, alright. Fine." She compulsively took off her glasses and rubbed them with her shirt, still blackened with soot, and immediately regretted it. Now her glasses were grimy as well. "What happened to you?"

"What do you mean?"

"Did he do something to you?"

"That's not your concern, and it doesn't have anything to do with my emotions. Those are fully under my control. And I'm strong."

"Yeah? Well, whatever. I'm not. So what do I do?"

"It doesn't matter that you're not strong. Just act like you think you are. Orochimaru needs you for something. Figure out what that is, figure out how to use it such that he keeps needing it. Then you will be safe."

"What if he stops needing me?"

"Then I'll protect you." She looked up from cleaning her glasses, squinting at him in disbelief, and smiled again.

"That sounds more like you."

"How's that?"

"You saved me before, in the Forest of Death. Now you're promising you'll protect me again."

"It's not a promise," Sasuke said flatly. "I'll do what I can, but I have my own reasons for being here."

"Fair enough." She started to walk away from him to find something to sit on and clean her glasses.

"Hey," he said. "What are you going to do? About the people that killed your parents?"

Karin did not turn around, for she could see the beginnings of hot tears blurring her vision. She waited a moment before speaking, to master the quaver in her voice. "Nothing. They don't deserve my time and going after those who killed my parents won't bring them back. But if ever I am strong enough, I will destroy the Village system. It has been the cause of too much pain and death to be considered viable any longer."

"I see." The flat tone of his voice was unreadable. By this time she had found a log to sit on, rotting, but still sturdy enough. She fingered the kunai in her holster, considering hacking off the rest of her hair to make it even. But she liked it this way. She was no longer who she once was: she was embittered, defiant, unhinged. It would make her seem unpredictable. Wherever she was going, she would make sure that those she met with on the way would think her a wildcard. She would never let them know her pain, only the swiftness and vitriol of her wrath.


	3. The Arrival

It was a low-slung, granite compound, with purplish tiling and a snake motif curling around the grate above its entrance. Built into the ground, it extended into it, beneath the root system of the forest’s towering, thick-trunked trees. 

“Welcome to Otogakure, Karin,” lisped Orochimaru softly.

It seemed harmless enough. Like a warehouse, more than anything. But when the three of them passed beneath the snake’s head that glared down at them from above the grate, she felt a chill shudder its way down her spine. A sudden, involuntary intake of breath betrayed her fear to her fellow travelers, and Orochimaru laughed mirthlessly.

“I am aware that the décor is…unconventional. But I can assure you that you will soon feel at home here.”

Karin nodded, more to herself than to anyone else. She was scared, there was no use pretending otherwise. She looked over at Sasuke, who was ignoring her completely, eyes downward, half-lidded. He had told her she couldn’t be this way. Vulnerable. Weak. Quick to anger. She would strive not to be. Whether she would succeed was another story entirely. But he had said, “I’ll protect you.” If he could. She believed that he could. It was the only thing she believed in right now, and she needed something to believe in, so she would keep believing in it. 

They had left the bright midday behind, and were passing through a cold, stone corridor, lit at first by the departing light of day, then gradually by feebly flickering sconces. Many passageways branched off from this one, and the deeper they went, the stranger became the sounds that emanated from those passageways: high-pitched keening, deep moaning, drawn-out bellows that could only be cries of agony. Finally, they reached what appeared to be the center of the compound, a huge, empty cavern with a ceiling so high that it could not be discerned in the half-light. Dozens of tunnels intersected here. Karin knew that even if she had wanted to, she could not have found her way back out of this place. 

She shivered, not so much from the taut, anxious fear that gnawed at her as with the chill of the place. The walls glistened with the water that dripped from the unseen ceiling above. 

Orochimaru came to a halt, turning to look at Sasuke and Karin. He spread his arms wide, and began to speak. “This is the center of Otogakure. Or rather, a part of Otogakure. You see, the Village Hidden in the Sound does not confine itself to any one place. Oh, no. It is everywhere, at the doorstep of every Kage and in the shadow of every village. But I like to think of this as its headquarters.” 

Karin nodded placidly. Or so she hoped. Did she appear placid enough? She couldn’t feel her face; she was so cold. 

“Karin. Sasuke knows this place well enough by now, he will show you around and then take you to your quarters. Once you are done with your tour, you all will eat and turn in for the night. Tomorrow, the real work begins.” Again, she nodded. It felt mechanical enough, but that also meant it probably did not appear to be natural. 

Orochimaru left them in an awkward silence. Sasuke said nothing, so she was about to speak up, when he turned to her, glaring angrily.

“Cut that shit out,” he spat. 

“W-what?” Karin spluttered, completely taken aback.

“Stop being scared!”

She no longer felt scared. She just felt angry. “You can’t just stop being scared! It doesn’t work that way.”

“Well, make it work.”

“I would if I could, believe me! Don’t tell me you weren’t scared when you came here!”

“I wasn’t.”

“Yeah, right. This place is creepy as hell. Don’t tell me that.”

“I wasn’t. I knew why I was here, and I knew exactly what I wanted from this place. There was nothing to be afraid of.”

“Well, in any case, at least you’re a shinobi. I’m anything but.”

He laid his hands on her shoulders and gripped them. It was not a warm gesture, rather forceful really, but it was certainly an unexpected one. 

“I told you before. You wouldn’t be here if Orochimaru didn’t need you. Figure out what he needs and figure out how to use it such that he keeps needing it. Then you won’t have to be afraid of anything.”

“But other than my sensory skills, I’m pretty worthless.”

“I don’t think Orochimaru is as strong as he claims to be, but I don’t think he’s wrong about you. If he needs someone, he will seek them out and make them his. You just have to play his game, so that he doesn’t own you.” It wasn't advice, it was an order.

“O-okay…” He removed his hands from her shouders and turned away from her.

“Now follow me. We’ve got a lot of ground to cover and not very much time.”

 

There was a faint gurgling coming from the back of the cavern they had just entered. 

“There’s another kid here, our age. Unlike us, though, he’s not here voluntarily.”

“What do you mean?” Sasuke didn’t answer, just gestured at her to follow him towards the back of the cavern.

Gradually, she was able to make out an enormous, luminous water tank, and in it, a boy their age. He had shimmering white hair, blue-tinged, and his deep lavender eyes glared at them accusingly through the thick glass of the tank. All that was unusual enough, but what was truly striking was the fact that the lower half of his body was like that of a shark, slick and streamlined, a uniform gray. 

“Suigetsu,” said Sasuke loudly, so that the boy would be able to hear them through the glass, “this is Karin. She’s new here.” 

“Karin, eh? Welcome to hell. Although I don’t see you in a tank, so you must’ve decided hell’s the place for you.” 

Karin didn’t know how to react to this. But she felt she ought to make some kind of an effort to befriend this boy. After all, she was barely willing to be here, herself.

“Hello, Suigetsu-san. I’m Karin. I’m…sorry you have to be here.”

“What did I tell you about honorifics?” Sasuke muttered.

“You and everyone else in this damn place,” Suigetsu hissed. His voice was remarkably clear, even though he was speaking underwater. “You’re as guilty as the rest if you don’t bust me out of this prison toute suite.”

Karin wanted to say something to console him, but nothing came to mind. There was nothing to say.

Sasuke sighed and turned away from the tank. “You can try talking to him, but if he refuses to be civil, just leave him be.

“Why the fuck should I be civil, Sasuke? I’m in prison! Stuck in this form against my will! You’d be far from civil yourself in my situation.” Sasuke began to walk away, leaving a furious Suigetsu to yell at his departing back. 

Karin turned from the tank too, regretfully, and followed Sasuke out. She couldn’t even imagine what this boy might be feeling, entrapped for who knew how long, subject to all kinds of experimental poking and prodding and worse. She promised herself she would come back here, at least once, and talk to him. Maybe try to make friends with him? Probably not possible, but worth a try.

 

After Sasuke had shown her around and helped her sufficiently internalize the labyrinthine network of tunnels, the two of them sat at a simple wooden table and waited for their meal. 

A servant in a plain beige tunic tied back at the waist with thick purple rope that most people here seemed to wear brought their dinner. Omusubi with okaka for Sasuke, which he ate slowly and deliberately, and gyoza for her. This was Karin’s least favorite food, and she had no appetite to begin with. She picked at it, but she eventually ate it. 

“Karin-san, what is your preferred dish?” inquired the servant solicitously. 

“Oh, uh…okonomiyaki.” 

“Then that is what will be prepared for you, next time.” Karin managed a nervous smile of gratitude.

“Thank you.” The servant left, and Sasuke stood up, with Karin following suit. 

“So they provide for us here,” she observed.

“Yes, well enough. Now follow me. There's a place you can wash up not far from here.”

“Alright.” She was still filthy, still wearing the same sweat-starched clothes in which Orochimaru had found her, crouching in the smoldering remnants of her home. A bath sounded sublime.

He took her down another hall well-lit by torches, and in the back of an adjoining cavern, there was a small alcove in which a hot spring bubbled. 

“I’ll have a servant bring you some clean clothes and a towel. There’s soap back there, and something to clean your hair with.”

“Okay, thanks.” She headed for the steaming pool. He still stood by the entrance to the cavern, though it was very far away. She would have complete privacy. “You don’t have to stay, you know. You showed me where my room was earlier.”

“I’d rather not leave you alone.”

“Who would bother me?” He didn’t even turn around, and he said nothing more. Again, a chill passed through her. So even now, she was not safe. Even Orochimaru’s investment in her well-being was not enough to grant her immunity to the predations of the other inhabitants of this place. The others who had sold their souls to learn “the illimitable possibilities of the shinobi.”

But he was there, protecting her. She would do as he said, she would play the game. She would not let Orochimaru own her. 

Karin stripped off her clothes - not an easy task given how they clung to the film of sweat and soot coating her skin - and sunk into the hot spring, scrubbing herself clean with the gritty water and sinking into a half-conscious state in its warmth. A distant shriek to curdle the blood brought her back to her senses, and she hurriedly toweled herself off and dressed in the beige tunic the servant had brought her in the meantime. 

“Sasuke,” she whispered once she had reached his side again, at the entrance to the cavern, “did you hear that?”

“I heard nothing,” he said flatly, “and neither did you.”


End file.
